Memento Mori
by Asphodelium
Summary: AU. Dash got ghost powers instead of Danny. This might just change him for the better, if it doesn't break him first. Between fighting ghosts and struggling to maintain a perfect image, he's going to need help if he's going to get out of this alive.
1. Origin

**Author's Note:** Well, I'm nervous. I'm not going to lie and say this story is awesome, I've got a ton of doubts about this. It's a weird premise and there's next to no dialouge in this chapter, which I know is a turn off for people, I'm not sure how long this story will be, and really I'm uncertain as to whether or not this is good enough to be posted. But this idea grabbed me and just wouldn't let go, no matter what. So as strange an idea as this is, I'm going to write it. Humanizing Dash and making him a well rounded character might be tricky, and I know I won't do this perfectly, but I _need_ to tell this story.

As always, criticism, suggestions, ideas, comments, any feedback at all is absolutely appreciated. I've never posted a chaptered fic before, just one shots, and thus I need all the help I can get to become a better writer and do this the way it should be done. Thank you in advance for reading this opening chapter and giving this story a chance.

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><p>Dash Baxter was perfect.<p>

He was blonde and blue eyed, tall, bulky, built like a brick wall, strong as an ox. He was never in detention or late for class, he never skipped, he never messed up. He always won the game and he always came through when people needed him. He practiced religiously and had never choked under pressure. His house was big and in a good neighborhood, his father ran a construction business and was a respectable, polite man everyone liked. His life was perfect. He had money, he had cool clothes, he had all the accessories the perfect cookie cutter American boy should have.

Dash's fist crashed into the locker, again and again, until the already defeated metal yielded and became nothing but jagged edges and dented, twisted lumps beneath him. He cut his hands on the next two hits and instead of stopping merely turned to slam his open palms on the surface of the storage room wall. The pain was sharp and immediate, an expression of all the hate and anger coursing through him, yet it wasn't enough. He needed more. He needed something to break, like he was breaking.

His father was going to kill him, but he didn't have to. Though he was sure to scream and rant at his son for being a complete failure, Dash was already pissed off at himself. He was already shaking with rage at just how stupid he was. A B plus? He didn't do that. He had to have perfect grades. He was supposed to maintain a high average, not just to get onto the team, not just to get his dad off his back, but to get into a good college. How did he expect to get anywhere if he was nothing more than a dumb jock? He was stupid and worthless and lazy and he clenched his fists in his hair hard enough to draw blood from his scalp, fingernails digging in, wanting to scream. If his grades slipped he'd end up seeing a school counselor and becoming a freak and an outcast, a loser, and he couldn't believe that he'd messed up like this after spending time being tutored in virtually every subject. He wanted to scream in frustration.

This was all because of those stupid ghost powers.

Everything was falling apart because of Danny Fenton. No, wait. Partial blame had to go to Mr. Enlai for making the two boys science partners. Then partial blame had to go to Fenton's dad for taking them down to his lab and rambling about science and ghosts. Part of the blame had to go to Danny for inviting Dash over to his house instead of just doing the assignment at Dash's place, but with Mr. Baxter's drinking it was too much a risk to let Danny come over. He had a reputation to maintain and an image to protect. He was supposed to be perfect and perfect people did not have family problems like this. Then again, someone perfect would've been smarter than to go inside the Ghost Portal and press the on button, even if it was to test out Mr. Fenton's new invention. It was supposed to be safe.

It really hadn't been. White hot agony so pure it left no room for thought or even screaming had poured through him as green light flooded everything. Thick green fog poured through the room, and Mr. Fenton had grabbed his son, pulling him upstairs. His first instinct was to protect his own child. Dash was left on the floor, then above it, floating uncontrollably, bobbing up and down as if being tugged by gentle waves. That was when he opened his eyes to assess the damage. The first thing he noticed was that his black leather jacket was now white. And he wasn't breathing. _That_ was when the realization he was floating hit him.

His gelled back hair had been mussed out of perfection by the explosion. A strand of it he tugged and stared at, cross eyed, confirming his suspicion it was now a deep, dark blue, nearly black. His own hands startled him; he was so pale it was like all the hours he'd put into practice out in the sun had been undone. There was a dull glow in front of him and when he moved towards the source of light, he saw it was his own reflection in the mirror. His cornflower blue eyes were now bright gold. His sleek new black jeans were white, his brand name white sneakers black, his white T-shirt black. And that aura around him, it was... it was just unnatural. Horror set in, but before he could process the full insanity of what he'd become he heard footsteps upstairs. He couldn't very well hide; he was a bulky football player who was easily 6"5. So he had shut his eyes and prayed to whatever God was listening this wouldn't last, tried to envision who he really was, and there was a burst of light around him before he landed on the floor of the Fenton's lab. When he looked up, his reflection was normal. When Mrs. Fenton came down shouting his name and asking if he was okay, he was. Or at least he looked it. And hey, when was Dash Baxter ever uncertain of himself or shaken up? He was just so over Danny and his freaky family. That was why he left at a pace that was practically a run, it's not like he was freaked out or anything.

That was a month ago, and the ramifications of that day were still being felt. With all this insanity around him, he couldn't focus on his studies or the team or his dad properly, and it was beginning to show. Running to duck into rooms or behind things wasn't an easy task for a star football player; all eyes were on him. Keeping this secret under wraps was an everyday uphill battle, especially when utterly insane things kept happening. He'd gone intangible and walked through a shut door once, fallen through the stairs to the ground below, and caught himself hovering in his room on more than one occasion.

He had to work out, he had practice, he had to clean the house, he had to work on his GPA for the sake of his future, he had to find tutors for his classes, he had to deal with Paulina's constant mixed signals and trying to make time to hang out with Kwan. He had no room in his life for superpowers. Had he a choice he'd hand them off gladly. But they were only getting stronger with time, so he had to tackle them head on like he did all his problems. Late at night, when his dad was passed out or asleep, he'd sneak out and go walk to some quiet alley and practice... whatever this was. Flying was most important because there was no way he could explain that away if it happened accidentally in front of people. Luckily, a lifetime of football had taught him to swallow fear and press on; as far below as things looked, it wasn't hard, it just took time to master. The intangibility was turning out to be nearly impossible for him to control so far, and then there were the energy blasts. Golden and flaring, shifting like flames, the blasts were easy to throw, much, much harder to aim. Even years of football throws hadn't prepared him for this level of force.

Dash slammed his hand against the wall again to bring himself back to the present, to his unacceptable grade, the incredible load of crap he was going to get for it (especially if his father wasn't sober today when Dash got home), and how stupid he was for slipping up.

And he still had to go fake his way through lunch, now with rage induced wounds on his hands he'd have to explain. He had to play it cool and make small talk and get through another day and every class period was starting to feel like a crucible of uncertainty. Maybe if he were someone lower profile he could skip it, but he was Dash Baxter, and his team mates would notice if he vanished even for a few hours. He sighed, running a hand through his slicked back hair, and then wondered if things could get any worse. Unfortunately, that sentence has never proceeded anything but trouble. No one got to think that and then have a nice day. Within mere seconds of that thought, screams erupted from the cafeteria, and he ran to the door, wrenching it open. What he saw next was the perfect blend of surreal, stupid and horrifying that made him regret being born in Amity Park.

Ghostly meat was flooding the hallways, chasing students and sending them fleeing down every available exit. You'll forgive Dash for taking a moment to process that. For a fleeting moment he wondered if this was what doing drugs was like. Then he heard a familiar voice in the crowd; Paulina's friend Star was screaming. And he didn't even think, he just ran down the rapidly emptying hallway towards the cafeteria, following the voice. When he entered the cafeteria it was totally empty save a raging green ghost. Star's scream had been cut off when a stack of plates had slammed into her head. At the sight of her laying motionless on the floor, rage, Dash's ever constant companion, came back to him full force and he scowled at the ghostly woman, too angry to be afraid.

Rings of light appeared around him, and then he was leaping at her, knocking her off her feet with the impulsive suddenness of his actions. The next thing he knew half the school's meatloaf supply was pinning him to the wall and she was smiling serenely at him.

"What a handsome young man," she said demurely. "Would you like a cookie?"

Having no witty retort for someone whose mood swings outdid even his father's, Dash could only shake his head.

"Oh. Well then _I will stuff you full of food until your throat bursts!_" she screamed, back into full rage mode.

It was only the arrival of Mr. and Mrs. Fenton that saved him. In the second she turned to be distracted by Jack Fenton's pun filled one liner, Dash phased through the meat, braced his legs against the wall and fired off a blast of golden ghostfire so magnificent it was nearly blinding. The cafeteria ghost lady screamed, collapsing just as Dash did. Light headed and suddenly very overheated, he stumbled backwards, phasing through the wall, and floated, intangible and flickering in and out of visibility, until he got out into the sunlight. There he collapsed behind the school on the soft grass, where he laid for an agonizingly long twelve and a half minutes as his head spun and his heartbeat filled his head. The glowing rings appeared again, and when he pulled himself to his feet his clothes were normal, which in his limited experience meant he himself was now normal. As normal as anything got anymore. The world of sunlight and daytime seemed foreign to him, as if he were stuck in some prolonged and complex dream he just couldn't escape. This crap belonged in a comic book, not in his life.

Walking the endlessly long distance to the front of the school where everyone had gathered, he was immediately sought out by Kwan, who looked relieved. "Where were you, man? We thought you were still in there or something!"

"Back door, genius," he snarked, trying to keep his tone normal when normal had just been shattered into a thousand pieces. "Just had to find a way around. I'm fine. Where's Paulina? And Star?" Dash struggled to keep his voice casual. The image of her unconscious body still made him shudder.

"It's so cool, bro! That Goth chick from our Bio class was hiding under one of the tables, and she carried Star out. Those ghost experts were too busy with the ghost, I guess."

Dash felt his blood run cold. He turned, and looked for the black clad girl. Next to the ambulance that had pulled up, she wasn't hard to find, talking to the paramedics to briefly explain what happened as Star was loaded up. Paulina opted to ride in the ambulance with her best friend, and as they pulled away, sirens still blaring, the Goth girl turned. Her black hair was lightly tousled by the wind, but her cold violet eyes were piercing, and she looked directly at him as Kwan, oblivious as always, went to go find another one of his friends in the crowd. The two were left staring at each other, a fifty foot gap between them, and he knew she knew what he was. She hated the popular kids. She could ruin him.

Instead she smiled reassuringly at him, and made a gesture towards the empty football field. She wanted to talk. She didn't hate him, or the freak he was, or how he'd messed up and now his grades were a footnote compared to how he'd failed to save Star in time. She didn't hate him, and that made one of them. Because after all the screw ups of today, he couldn't imagine why she didn't reveal him on the spot. But he was too relieved to question it as the rage and adrenaline had by now long left him, leaving him exhausted and barely keeping his perfect 'I don't care because I'm awesome' mask in place.

And if his knees shook weakly as he walked to meet her, that was just because today was weird, not because he'd been scared for a second there.

Dash Baxter didn't have fears. He was perfect.


	2. Weird

**Author's Note: **My original idea was to have each chapter correspond to an episode of the show, introducing villains and such in the same order. The problem with this is that these chapters seem to be getting much, much longer on my computer as I attempt that, and there's fifty three episodes of the show. So some things are going to have be cut and things will unfold differently with Dash at the helm than they would with Danny, so while I'll try to stick to the timeline faithfully, the chapter equals episode formula will probably not end up holding true. This chapter, for instance, is more of establishing Dash's character and background so I don't have to keep re-remphasizing it later. I also threw in a few glanced-over OCs because Dash hangs out with athletes/cheerleaders and there have to be more of those to the school than just the handful we saw on the show.

I would like to thank all of my reviewers. To answer some questions posed: jeanette9a, Danny will get involved later but is definitely going to be in on Dash's secret sooner or later, trust me. Oak Leaf Ninja, I'm glad I'm fleshing out Dash and it doesn't seem too forced or too much like making him an OC-stand in and I hope you'll tell me in the future if I veer too far into OOC territory. Finally, Elisabeth Hill, I love you too. Thank you for helping boost my confidence on a story idea I'm very nervous about, and helping me feel like so far I'm keeping Dash Dash-y enough.

As always, criticism, complaints, thoughts, ideas, suggestions and feedback are always appreciated. I would also like to thank those who put this on alerts, as I find that complimentary as well. Although this chapter continues to be more set up than action, I promise action is most definitely coming pretty much nonstop after this and I thank you all for sitting through the walls of text that my writing tends to turn into. Thank you all for reading.

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><p>Sometimes Dash felt like he was watching his life from the outside.<p>

This could not possibly be his real life. This wasn't happening. There was no way he was sitting in the shade under the bleachers with Sam Manson, resident Goth soapbox Sadie. There was no way he could fly, or change colors, or whatever was going on. Some part of him rejected the very words 'ghost powers' because they were simply too far removed from the world he lived in. Dashiel Hadley Baxter did not give half a crap about ghosts, the paranormal, the afterlife, religion, God, or any of that, because the grind of day to day life took up every spare second he had.

Keeping up this kind of image, always wearing the right thing and saying the right thing and doing the right things with the right people to earn everyone's approval was a full time job. Football was a full time job. Keeping up his grades when anything less than perfect would cause a fight at home was a full time job. He simply had no extra time to add this level of craziness onto his work load. He barely got any sleep as it was. There was no way this could be happening, and yet it had, and he'd been living with it for a month, and now he was going to sit here and talk about it like it was some after school special. With a girl whose name he barely knew. He knew she was friends with Danny, who he hated, and that she was highly outspoken. That was all he knew.

His hatred for Danny was a very old wound, one he did not allow to heal. Though Danny was oblivious as to the source of Dash's rage, Dash was happy to keep it that way. To talk to Danny about their interactions would mean having to examine Dash's need for control. They would have to talk about his flaws, and he couldn't afford flaws. Unable to stop the wellspring of anger inside himself, Dash had resigned himself to working it out. He ran until he couldn't take another step, he practiced until football was like a second language, he took weight lifting when that was offered as part of gym class. If ever he were to truly let loose on Danny, someone as big and bulky as Dash could easily kill the smaller boy. That was what made him throw Danny in a locker instead of beating him to a pulp, that was why he mocked him instead of just breaking his arm.

Dash's anger scared him. It was especially bad today. When he'd seen Star he hadn't even paused to look around, he'd leapt into battle mode. He'd been so furious he could have killed had his opponent not already been a ghost. That thought was sobering, terrifying, made him hate himself. Hate he would then take out on something else, which would feed back into the cycle while the smile of a confident jock never left his face. That was a role he'd been playing for years, the confident dauntless sports hero.

Sam had seen him out of that role. And he didn't know _what_ he was when he wasn't a jock. There was no greater identity to him. It wasn't as if he was actually a good guy deep down and he was just misunderstood. He was an asshole, he knew it, he hated it about himself and that was all there was to it. All he could do was try better, and try harder, fumbling desperately for perfection. Happiness came so easily to all his friends, all his team mates. If he were as good as them it would come to him too. Until then he had to fake it. Caught in the act of not acting, seen just reacting and living, that was unknown territory. He had no idea what Manson thought of him right now, because _he_ didn't know what he thought of himself right now.

"Is Star okay?" he asked after the silence had stretched on to an awkward point.

"She might have a concussion, but her vitals were stable," Sam said gently, smiling. "Paulina actually dropped the ice queen act for a while there. I'm sure she'll give you updates straight from the hospital if you call."

"Or text. Paulina can text faster than Foley can do math," he joked weakly, with a hint of his usual cockiness. His voice only wavered a little when he asked, "So are you going to hand me over to Fenton's parents now?"

She blinked, surprised. "What?"

"You're Fenton's best friend. I never see one of you without the other nowadays. You're in AP classes. You know about the accident. You know... what's going on." He couldn't bring himself to say that he was part ghost. He couldn't. The idea was still unbelievable. "You saw me do ghost crap. And ghosts are kind of the embodiment of evil, last time I checked."

"I saw you," Sam confirmed, voice stern and serious. "I saw you risk your life to protect a girl you barely know from a ghost whose powers totally outmatched yours - I'm sorry, but they do. And you did it with no witnesses."

He snorted. "Obviously not, Manson, or we wouldn't be having this conversation."

"No, what I mean is... you remember in Mr. Lancer's class, that one book we read with the quotes, and how we were supposed to talk about what they meant? One of the lines in there was 'character is what you are in the dark'. Meaning, when nobody's watching." She looked him in the eyes. "And when nobody's watching you went in to save somebody and then sneak off and never get thanks for it. That's what you are. I mean, I didn't think that was who you were, but I'm Goth. We're all about understanding multifaceted personalities. You're a little bit ghost. You're also a little bit good."

"If I were better she wouldn't be in the hospital right now," he scowled, looking away. "But I get what you're saying. If I don't go psycho, you won't let the Fentons experiment on me?"

She sighed, smacking her face with her palm. "You're such a thick headed jerk. Yes, that's what I'm saying. It might be smart to start laying off Danny, though. Given your history, and who his parents are..."

"He has it coming," Dash muttered darkly, his eyes narrowing as he clenched his fists.

"For what?" The black haired girl asked, raising both eyebrows. Danny was her friend and she would defend him to the ends of the Earth. Dash's tone, however, said something _had_ happened, and that made her wonder what the start of the feud had been to begin with. "He hasn't bothered you in forever, Dash. What is it with you and him?"

"Something I don't know _you_ well enough to get into, Manson. But he'll know something's up if I just suddenly quit acting normal around him. For now we'll say I'm still PO'd over the accident 'cause getting electrocuted freaking hurts. That's true, more or less." He flexed his hands, noting the previous injuries had healed over in his ghost form. "I guess everything I do will have to be a lot more planned out from now on."

"I'll help," she volunteered. His disbelieving look was its own response. "I know. I know I don't owe you anything and I'm not really not who you want to spend your time with, but I don't want Danny's parents to get ahold of you. Danny would probably hear you out, even though you're you, because he just doesn't believe what his parents do. They... wouldn't care what you did, probably, and I don't want you to get hurt."

"You should. I kind of make your friends' lives Hell, in case you hadn't noticed."

"Ease off of them. Think of it like a trade." She smiled at him, purple lipstick somehow not smeared despite the insanity of the day. "Just trust me."

Trust? He didn't do tru- oh, wait. Every single thing he didn't do, he was doing so far today. Even though the idea of handing his secret identity over to a complete stranger was terrifying, he really didn't have a choice. But Sam wasn't like other girls. She was always preachy and actually tried to live up to her own high ideals. If there was one person in school besides Kwan he thought could keep their mouth shut, it would probably have to be Sam. So he nodded at her, seriously.

"Yeah. Well. This is still weird as heck."

"No argument here, Baxter."

In retrospect, he'd look back at this moment and laugh. It had not yet _begun_ to get weird on them yet.

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><p>After managing to hide his poor grade from his father, a task accomplished by hyping the upcoming football game, Dash then spent an hour on homework, went to football practice for an hour and a half, came home to change clothes, went over to his math tutor's house and, one hour after that, finally got to sit down to eat dinner.<p>

By this time it was seven in the evening, and the blonde found himself starving even more so than usual, his desperate desire to consume food something he attributed, after skimming his Biology textbook, to how much ghostly energy he'd used. Energy was energy. He'd used too much, and now his body was begging him to replenish that energy stash before he ended up passing out, something that hadn't happened since he was in fifth grade. He remembered that day; having not eaten due to nerves, he'd passed out upon impact with another football player. His dad had chewed him out when they got home, ranting about how he looked like a pansy out there. After that their house was always well stocked with food, something he took advantage of as he worked his way through half the pot of spaghetti in the fridge.

More than ever, the events of the cafeteria ghost drove home to him that he needed to practice more with his ghost powers. He should've been there faster, should've had the common sense to grab Star and phase out, but his control was awful. He had to do better and, after spending a little bit of time on the phone with Paulina, who cheerfully told him Star didn't have a concussion and would be out of the hospital tomorrow morning, he headed out to practice. He had never been able to afford to be less than perfect. This was no exception.

So he left his house at about nine that night, and ended up returning at around eleven, simply too tired to keep going. He worked until his powers simply shorted out on him and he was forced to walk home in his normal form, which strained his already abused muscles. Exhausted, he ate another helping of spaghetti, passed out on his bed and slept dreamlessly. Or if he did dream, he didn't remember it. Life had gotten so weird that dreams would be mundane by comparison.

Then he woke up at six thirty to begin the nightmare of his life again.

After an early morning run, some basic exercises, a shower, going over his homework again to double check it, scarfing down breakfast and quickly reading the short story Lancer had assigned them all for English, he made it to school early as always to go run the social gambit every football player had to. He had people to talk to, a smidge of typical high school gossip to catch up on and more importantly he had to make sure there were no rumors going around about a weird ghost kid with golden eyes and black hair. The school bus ride was spent blaring out the world with his iPod, music he barely heard and only used as an excuse to look cool - and get out of having to talk about yesterday's oh so amazing ghost incident.

Every group in school sort of had their own spot in the school commons where they stood or sat to talk. For Dash's circle of friends, that was the center by the flagpole. He spotted Star and Paulina, with one of their cheerleader friends, Ophelia, who looked worried, her lilac eyes darting between Star and Paulina, her bobbed auburn hair catching the early morning sunlight. Star was saying something to both of them, waving her hands dismissively in a 'no big deal' gesture. Kwan was with them, frowning, unconvinced, his bright teal-green eyes wide with concern. Marcus, a fellow football player with a good sense of humor, stood in the center of it all clearly trying to diffuse the situation, his dreadlocks a lighter shade of brown than his dark sepia skin. He caught Dash's gaze and waved him over, gray eyes full of mirth as always. Valerie was next to him, leaning her head against his shoulder and smiling.

This was his group, his friends, and not one of them knew what Manson knew. Not one of them knew his father's drinking was getting worse or that he liked soap operas or that he listened to dubstep to help himself focus. They didn't know he didn't want to be a football player when he graduated, didn't know despite rumors to the contrary he was a virgin, didn't know about how sometimes when he couldn't sleep and his anger was welling up inside him he'd go for runs in the dead of night until he couldn't run anymore. They didn't know that he still played Pokemon and liked to look up words in foreign languages on his computer when he was bored. They didn't know that at parties he always found somewhere to pour his drink out in secret because he didn't want to be his father.

Sam Manson knew more about him than these people did and he'd been seeing these people every day at school since fourth grade.

He couldn't remember much of what he did that day. Talk, mostly. Talk about Star, talk about the upcoming dance, the upcoming game, who was dating who, how lame certain people were, whatever. It all blended together like it did every other day, a blur of note taking and one liners and making sure everybody knew he was there and unaffected by everything as always. Talk big about the upcoming game that was actually a very intimidating match up, ask Paulina to the dance out of habit rather than genuine interest, text with Ophelia through most of English class, make plans to hang out with Marcus and Kwan after practice and go get a burger. It was normal, and like most normal days, he lived it as if from afar, experiencing things vaguely, none of it really affecting him.

Up until the point where, during lunch, a ghost built like the Terminator on steroids burst in, wielding weaponry Dash couldn't even describe, yelling something about hunting.

This? This was why he felt like his own life was a movie. And also why the word 'weird' was losing all meaning.


End file.
